Say It Back
by Empathist
Summary: Fluffy one-shot set about three months after Doing It Again. No real plot, more of a snapshot of how Brendan and Ste are doing. For Tessa with love :) xxx


"Where you off?"

Brendan's voice was low, but still it made Ste jump.

"Thought you was asleep," Ste said. "Did I wake you up?"

"Felt you get out'a bed, didn't I."

"You been lying there watching me get dressed?"

"Yep."

"Pervert."

"No, Steven, if I was lying here watching you getting _un_dressed, then I'd be a pervert."

Ste laughed softly.

"Yeah, well, you should'a said you was awake anyway, cos then we could'a talked."

"Talked? About what?"

"Nothing! Don't be paranoid. I mean, chatted. We could'a chatted, cos I won't see you all day..."

"Why, where you going?" Brendan propped himself up on his elbows to get a better view of Ste's skinny body before it got zipped away inside his tracksuit top.

"Taking the kids back to Amy. You know I am, I told you, her bloke's away so I'm gonna take her and the kids out."

"Oh yeah, you told me. A date with the ex."

"It's not a date, Bren, it's a day out with me kids. Right, if you're gonna be funny about it – "

"I'm not."

"Good. I'll see you tonight, okay, cos you'll be gone to work by the time I get home."

"Come here, then."

"No, I'll come and say goodbye before we go, alright?" Ste headed for the door.

"Steven, I said come here."

"I in't got time, gotta get the kids up."

"Steven! Jesus, I ain't gonna _delay_ you." Brendan sat up and swung his legs out of bed. "Just come here, will you?"

"What for?" Ste looked at Brendan, rolled his eyes and went to him and leaned down to kiss his mouth. "Happy now?"

Brendan grabbed his wrist as he walked away.

"Not so fast."

"I said, I in't got time to – "

"Fucksake, Steven, I just wanna bite your backside. Jesus, you're hard work, you know that?"

Ste sighed, then he hooked his thumb into the back of his trackies and boxers, and pulled them down to expose one cheek.

Brendan bulged the flesh – and it was the only part of Ste which bore anything that could be described as flesh – in the V between his thumb and fingers, licked his lips, and closed his mouth on it. It was smooth and warm, and yielded to his bite. He didn't linger: one bite, a quick kiss where his teeth had left a pink mark, and then he got back under the covers.

"Happy now, are you?" Ste pulled up his trackies and rubbed his bum.

"Mhm."

"Weirdo. Right, I'll bring the kids in to say bye before we go. Make sure you're decent."

"I might say the same for you," Brendan said, noticing the distinct bulge that had appeared in the front of Ste's trackie bottoms.

"Shut up. That's your fault, that is." He tugged his top down to cover up the evidence, and went off to get Leah and Lucas up and ready.

:::::::

Brendan was asleep again when Ste peered round the door to check that he was covered up before he let the kids in.

"You can wake him up, but do it gently or he'll be grumpy, okay?"

"Okay," Leah said, and she went in and leaned across the mattress and whispered, "Brendan, we're going now."

"BYE!" shouted Lucas.

"What the f– ?" Brendan's eyes snapped open. "Jees– "

Lucas roared with laughter.

"Lucas! Say sorry to Brendan," Ste said. "You wouldn't like it, would you?"

"Sorry, Brendan."

"S'okay, son," Brendan said tightly. "Next time I'll throw you out the window, though, so."

"No you won't," Lucas said uncertainly.

"Right, come on," Ste said, "Say bye bye to Brendan, or we'll be late and Mummy will be cross with me."

"See you next week," said Leah. "We'll phone you."

"Okay, sweetheart."

"Bye." Lucas waved from the doorway.

"Good lad," Brendan said.

Ste ushered them both out.

"Got the car keys?" he asked Brendan.

"Jacket pocket, probably." Brendan paused, and then he said, "Drive carefully, yeah?" because Ste had only just passed his test, and the thought of him having an accident made Brendan's heart stop whenever he let himself think about it.

"You don't have to worry about me, Brendan. I been driving for years, in't I?"

"Just don't want my car getting scratched, is all."

"See you tonight," Ste said to Brendan, and kissed him. "Love you."

"Love you too."

:::::::

Just because Ste and Amy were spending the day together while her boyfriend was out of town, it didn't mean he'd be remembering his old feelings for her. That was what Brendan told himself, but still the thought scratched at him. Ste wasn't like him: Ste's interest in girls had been genuine and had taken a while to die off even after Brendan had shown him who he really was, whereas with Eileen, however much Brendan had tried to make himself want her, there was nothing.

He burned with embarrassment when he recalled those times. The desperate prayers to be normal, the panic when she'd wanted him. Retreating to the bathroom and letting shameful thoughts of boys – maybe of Pete; maybe of a scrawny scrap of a lad he'd seen once in a dream – rise from the hiding place inside him where he kept the worst things, till he was able to return to the bedroom with a hard-on Eileen would think she'd brought about. It was lucky he'd been her first proper boyfriend, or she'd have known it wasn't meant to be over so quickly.

And it had only been Eileen, whereas Ste had had Amy and Rae and others, Brendan was sure. For Ste, it hadn't been about conning himself and the world that he was straight; he had genuinely got it – whatever it was that men were meant to feel when they looked at women, Ste had felt. It was alien to Brendan, and it amazed him that Ste could ever have been that way, when nowadays his appetite was so opposite.

Brendan made himself focus on that: what he was like now.

He left it until early evening before he went out of the club onto the busy street, stepped around the after-work crowd who were beginning to arrive, and called Ste.

"Not home yet, no?" he asked when Ste answered.

"Yeah, been home a while."

"Thought you'd be late, you know, put the kids to bed then get some... whadda they call it? _Quality time_ with the lovely Amy."

There was a silence, and Brendan imagined Ste frowning as he tried to work out what the problem was. Then he said, "What you on about now, Brendan? Are you – ? You _are_, aren't you? You're getting all jealous cos I spent the day with Amy!"

"Fuck off, I ain't jealous, that's... That's stupid."

"You're dead right, Brendan, it _is_ stupid. D'you really think I'm ever gonna – ?"

"No. Course not."

"Yeah you do! Brendan, I can't believe you sometimes. How can you be jealous of _Amy_?"

Was he laughing? He was, and Brendan felt himself going on the defensive.

"Don't flatter yourself, boy, I'm just pissed off because you've got my car and I had to get a fucking taxi to work. I ain't _jealous_. Jesus."

"Alright. Glad we've cleared that up." Ste still sounded amused.

"I gotta go. See you later."

"See you later," Ste said. "Love you."

"Yeah."

"Brendan? Say it back."

It was what they always did. _Love you. Love you too_. Every time they parted, every time they hung up the phone. Brendan imagined that Ste thought it was about sentiment or romance, but that wasn't it for Brendan. For Brendan, it was so that if something happened – and the fear of something happening never went away, even though they were married now and in love and there was no one out to get them any more – whichever one of them was left would know what the last words they'd exchanged had been.

"Love you too," said Brendan.

:::::::

Ste had never been to the club. Brendan's contract as manager had started three weeks after their wedding day so he'd been running it for a couple of months now, but it was in the city centre, a bus or a cab or a car ride from home, so Ste couldn't easily drop in. It wasn't just that, though. Ste knew that it was a big deal for Brendan, getting back on his feet after his time in prison. He hadn't wanted to show up at the club and make Brendan feel as if he had to impress him.

Brendan had talked about it a lot at home – about his plans for the business for the two years he would be running the place, the changes he was making to the door policy and the staff uniforms, the way the members-only floor upstairs operated. Ste loved listening to him; he loved how Brendan ran things past him, even if he was only thinking out loud. He was impressive when he talked like that, a proper businessman, and after the post-prison months when he'd had nothing much to do, it was exciting to see him like that, his brain switched on, leaving for work each day suited and booted, and coming home tired but no longer drifting. He was like the man Ste had first fallen in love with more than five years ago, only better, in every way Ste could think of.

Tonight, as Ste had the car for once, he drove there. He'd given Brendan enough time now to settle in, he thought, and he also felt bad about teasing him about being jealous, so he'd decided to make it up to him by picking him up from work at the end of the night.

Brendan was behind the bar when his phone rang.

"Alright, Steven?"

"I would be, if your bouncers would let me in."

"What? Where are you?"

"I'm outside your work, in't I. I told them I'm your husband but they wouldn't – "

"I'll come and get you."

Brendan pushed his way through the crush of people and out of the door. He expected to see Ste stroppy and indignant, maybe some sort of altercation going on between him and the two doormen, but he found them all standing chatting together.

"Sorry, boss, we weren't sure if..." one of the men began.

"It's okay, lads, he's my fella." Brendan ran his eyes over Ste, taking in the tracksuit and trainers. "Obviously he don't know about the dress code..."

"Oi!"

"... But it don't apply to him. Just him, mind." Brendan clapped the nearer of the two doormen on the shoulder. "Working well, boys."

"Cheers, boss."

Brendan steered Ste inside and towards the bar.

"To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Thought I'd drive you home," Ste shouted over the music, "Save you getting a taxi."

"That's very considerate of you, Steven. Terrifying, but considerate."

"Shut up, I can drive! And you can't, can you, cos I bet you've had a drink."

"Point. Shame you can't have one." Brendan watched a rainbow of lights strobe across Ste's face – he was beautiful. "I'll make you something."

He went back behind the bar and mixed a drink. Ste stood across from him, the only still point in the clamour of people angling for the attention of the bar staff and each other, and watched him do it.

A handful of ice went into the shaker, then white peach juice, then enough cranberry to make the finished drink pink. A squeeze of lime. Brendan shook it, then strained it into a chilled martini glass and topped it up to the brim with soda. He looked at it, deciding what it needed; then he speared on a cocktail stick a couple of vodka-infused black cherries, and presented the finished article to Ste.

Ste sipped. Considered. Sipped again.

"That's lush, that."

"Good. Come on, I'll show you the members' floor, it's quieter."

"That where the footballers hang out? Any fit ones in tonight?"

"Funny guy."

Upstairs, past another heavy and a female greeter, the ambience changed. When Brendan had started working here, both floors had been much the same only with a more moneyed crowd upstairs. He'd changed it straight away, made the lighting less gaudy up here, turned the speakers down a bit; he'd clamped down on the number of guests a member could bring up, once he'd realised that they tended to trawl for girls downstairs and it had been in danger of turning into a pick-up joint for wannabe Wags.

There'd been some complaining at the tightening of the rules from some of the members who were accustomed to getting their own way, but once they'd worked out that Brendan wasn't a pushover – and the whispers about his reputation as a convicted killer helped with that – they'd got over it.

"Bit posher than Chez Chez, innit," Ste said, and as he said it he thought maybe this was the first time he'd said the name of the old place since Brendan had come home from prison.

"Just a bit. You like it?"

"Yeah." Ste took a mouthful of his drink. "I like this."

"Yeah? I'll have to think of a name for it."

"What?" He put his drink down on the bar where he and Brendan were leaning as they surveyed the room. "No, I don't mean the drink, I mean... I like _this_. You know, coming to see you at work, right, cos that was always... We always did that, d'you remember, Brendan? We always... cos we just could, you know, cos the flat, the club, the deli, they was all close by, but now I'd have to get the bus to come here... and I miss it. Do you?"

"Miss the bus?"

Ste tutted, "No, you know what I mean."

He bit one of the cherries off the cocktail stick in his drink, and sucked on it absently. Brendan dragged his eyes away from him: it was distracting.

"You mean, do I miss you pestering me while I'm trying to work? I dunno, Steven, long as I got some eye candy to look at..."

He indicated across the room where a group of men were sitting drinking.

"Is that that football player?" Ste asked.

"Didn't think football was your thing."

"It's not, but I know him, don't I. He was in the papers when you..."

"When I was inside. Yeah, I remember." It had been a big story, a young star player coming out as gay. "It was fucking... _freaky_."

"Brendan! You can't say that. There must be loads of gay football players, not just him and his boyfriend."

"I ain't talking about them being gay. I'm talking about a City lad getting off with a fella from United. Just ain't natural."

It took a moment or two for Ste to realise that Brendan was trying to be funny, and then he laughed, and then he remembered what Brendan had said about eye candy.

"Does he come here a lot, then?"

"Why?" Brendan asked. "D'you fancy him or something?"

"Why? Do you?"

"What if I did? Not jealous are you, Steven?"

Ste turned away because he knew Brendan could always read his feelings in his face.

Brendan took the opportunity to nick the remaining cocktail cherry, and dropped the empty stick back into the glass.

"I don't get jealous, me," Ste said.

"Course you don't."

"I don't." Ste picked up his drink. "So do you fancy him or what?"

"He ain't bad."

"His boyfriend's fitter."

"Is that right?"

"I'm just saying – " Ste frowned. "Have you took my cherry?"

"Wouldn't be the first time."

"Proper comedian, you are."

"Ain't I just."

"You got an office here?"

"Wanna see it?"

"Too right I do."

They went back downstairs and made their way through the throng of people to the club's office. As soon as they were inside, Ste's hands were around the back of Brendan's neck and he was kissing him, taking Brendan off guard so he staggered till his back was against the wall. He recovered and grabbed Ste's hips and moved with him until he hit the door with a crash. They broke apart for a second and Brendan touched the back of Ste's head where it had banged against the door.

"That hurt?"

"Dun't matter." Ste kissed him again and felt Brendan pressing his groin against him.

Brendan had the keys in his hand, and he felt for the lock, and locked the office door.

"Horny, ain't you?" He bit Ste's lip.

"You want me." Ste forced his hand between their bodies and squeezed Brendan's cock through his trousers. "You want me more than you want that bloody footballer."

Brendan grabbed his hand away and kept hold of his wrist tightly. He kissed him hard, and then sank to his knees. Ste's cock was straining inside the soft fabric of his boxers and tracksuit bottoms, and Brendan pressed his open mouth over the mound so that Ste felt his hot breath through the layers of cotton.

The door and the floor thrummed with the music from the speakers outside.

With his free hand, Ste tugged down his pants, and as his cock sprang free Brendan caught it in his mouth. He teased the tip, slicing its slit with his tongue, and Ste cried out, "Fuck... Ah, fuck," with a hiccup of breath in between.

Brendan released him from his mouth and wet his fingers with spit. He delved up between Ste's thighs and stroked across his hole then pushed inside, and rubbed his thumb over Ste's balls as his fingers explored.

He felt the pulse in Ste's wrist speeding in his grip.

"Footballer's fit fucking boyfriend do this for you, would he?" Brendan asked, and he looked up at Ste's face: his eyes were closed and his mouth gaped. "Amy do this for you, would she?"

"No. No. No... _oh_... fuck, Bren..."

Brendan gave his cock a lick and then began to suck it, softly then hard then softly again, and Ste's hole was tight and warm and alive around his fingers, and he smelt of soap and skin, and the rhythm of his heart beat harder in his wrist the tighter Brendan squeezed, until it seemed to beat in Brendan's heart too, _bang, bang, bang_.

_Bang, bang, bang_. The knock on the door came as Ste came. Maybe it made him come – Brendan felt the convulsion in him and the jerk of his hips at the same moment as the sound of the knock.

"Brendan? We're getting low on change," called the voice the other side of the door.

Brendan swallowed rapidly.

"Okay, give me a minute," he shouted, and then he looked up at Ste to watch him react – with a slight flinch – as he slid his fingers out.

Ste slumped against the door. Brendan got to his feet and smiled into Ste's face as he pulled his trousers up for him. Ste grinned back; he was panting, and his cheeks were flushed.

Brendan found a tissue to wipe his hands on, then poured a whiskey from the bottle on the desk, swirled it around his mouth and swallowed it, washing the last warm traces of Ste's cum down his throat.

As he unlocked the door, he took Ste's hand and held it against his crotch, and kissed him, and said, "To be continued."

:::::::

At the end of the night, when all the punters had left, one of the staff said to Brendan, "I wondered what he'd be like. Your partner, I mean."

"Oh yeah?" Brendan wondered what was coming.

"I mean, I guessed he'd be attractive, but he looks like a model doesn't he?" And then she said with a smile and an arched eyebrow, "Bet he can wind you round his little finger, that one."

Brendan glanced at Ste who was standing waiting for him near the door. The coloured lights were off now and the place was lit only by a couple of worklights and the neon glow of the exit signs, but Ste seemed to carry his own light within him. Best not to tell him what Maria had said, Brendan thought, or he might realise that there was no one he couldn't have.

Ste watched Brendan as he finished his checks and set the alarm after the last of the staff had got into their taxis. It was ages since he'd seen him how he'd seen him tonight: proficient, in charge and in his element, looking out for the people who worked for him and being looked up to by those people. It was scary how attractive he was: who wouldn't see him and want to find out what he was like – the private Brendan, the real Brendan? Ste felt a buzz, knowing that other guys must want to try their luck with his man, but Ste was going to make sure Brendan would never be tempted. He was Ste's, and that was that.

:::::::

Ste was nervous with Brendan in the car, but Brendan managed to resist making any comments on his driving, so they got home without an argument.

"You know Maria, the red headed girl?" Brendan said as they went into the flat.

"The one when we went upstairs?"

"Yeah. Know what she said about you? She reckons you look like a model."

"Does she?"

"I told her you don't always look like that, it was the afterglow from the blowjob making you look all – "

"You never!"

"No, I never."

"Did she really say I look like a model though?"

"Yep. A chavvy one, but..."

"Is that what she – ?"

Brendan got hold of his face and kissed him.

"Come to bed."

"Okay." They kissed again, then Ste said, "Need the loo first, me."

"Know how to kill the moment, don'tcha."

"Shut up. I'm only thinking of you, in't I."

"Hurry up, then."

Brendan gave his bum a slap, and went and got undressed and got into bed.

When Ste came into the room, he stripped off in seconds, and Brendan smiled as he held the cover up for him to get in: there was no mistaking Ste's intentions, no pretence at coyness, no expectation that either of them needed to do any seducing tonight. He was in Brendan's arms and they were belly to belly, thigh to thigh, tongue to tongue, taking handfuls and mouthfuls of each other. Once, Ste tried to roll Brendan onto his back, but Brendan resisted. The second time, he let him, and let him have a moment when he thought he was in charge before crushing his ribs in his arms so Ste cried out involuntarily as the air was forced from his lungs.

Brendan laughed and loosed his hold. Ste scrambled till he was on his knees straddling him, and reached for the lube from the bedside cabinet. He flipped the lid open.

"Give us your hand."

Brendan obliged and Ste squirted a thick glob from the tube into Brendan's palm before chucking the tube aside and falling forward to kiss and suck at Brendan's neck. Brendan spread him with one hand and lubed him with the other. Ste gasped as the cold gel assaulted him, then writhed with pleasure as Brendan's fingers warmed it and slipped through it.

"Dirty little whore," Brendan said, and felt Ste's teeth snapping sharply on his earlobe in response.

He grabbed Ste's arse to pull him forward, and ran his hands up the curve of his spine.

Ste sat up suddenly, his hands planted on Brendan's shoulders and his weight leaning on them.

"You wanna fuck me, Brendan?" He looked down at Brendan's face, and there was no doubt that the answer was _Yes_, and he could feel Brendan's cock hard underneath him as he sat on him, but he wanted him to say it. "Ask me, right. Ask me."

"_Ask_ you? You're begging for it, mate."

"I ain't begging for nothing." He raised himself up on his knees and Brendan's cock rose with him, it's tip grazing his buttock. Ste took it in his fist and felt it thick and tight and ready, and he positioned it against his ring and pushed, and made himself open. He arched backwards as he sank down, and heard Brendan grunt out, _Jesus_, as his body swallowed him up.

He rode him slowly at first, circling his hips till he found the angle where Brendan's shaft would grind against the spot inside him that made his own cock stiffen and all his skin feel as if it was shimmering. He closed his eyes and wrapped a hand around his dick, until Brendan jerked his pelvis upwards and pulled Ste's hand away with two fingers hooked inside the silver cuff on his wrist.

"Selfish little fuck," Brendan said.

Ste gave him a glazed-eyed scowl, and accelerated his hips.

"Bastard," Ste said when Brendan stopped him touching himself with his other hand too. "You better wank me off, then."

Brendan looked up at him. Ste was all spiky tension and unruly angles, a sensual mess.

"You're a sight, d'you know that?" Brendan said, and when Ste frowned at him he laughed.

"You laughing at me?" Ste shook his wrists free of Brendan's hands and clambered off him, the burn as Brendan's cock slid out of him startling them both. "Don't laugh at me."

"I ain't laughing at you. Jesus."

"Yeah you was."

"I wasn't!"

"What was you laughing at, then, eh?"

"I dunno, Steven. _Us_. It's..."

"It's what?"

"Come here, Steven. I'm gonna fucking burst."

"Don't care."

"Okay."

They fought then, sending the pillows flying and the bed rattling against the wall, grappling wildly until Ste was on his back with Brendan holding him down. They were breathless, and they were laughing, and then they were kissing.

"What was you gonna say?" Ste asked as Brendan kissed down his breastbone.

"About what?" He stopped what he was doing and looked at Ste.

"You was gonna say something about us. You said, _It's_..?" Ste touched Brendan's face.

"It's..." Jesus. "It's fucking... It's fucking _everything_, Steven, okay? You and me. You and me."

Ste looked at him seriously.

"I know," he said.

"So turn over."

Ste rolled onto his stomach and Brendan plunged straight back into him from behind then rolled with him so they were both on their sides, locked together. Brendan reached in front of him and jerked him off, roughly and rapidly, and when Ste's body convulsed as he came it made Brendan come too, biting into Ste's shoulder at the moment of climax so there was an edge to Ste's cries.

They lay afterwards huddled on the side of the bed away from the wet patch, Ste in Brendan's arms.

"You gonna go to sleep now, Bren?"

"Must be three a.m., so yeah, might be a good idea."

"Okay. Night, then. Love you."

"Night."

They kissed, and fell into silence, and Brendan shut his eyes and waited for Ste to speak as he knew he would.

"Brendan?"

"Hm?"

"You not gonna say it back, then?"

"Steven, you know I love you, okay? Why's it matter if I didn't say it that time?"

"Cos if you died in the night, right, I'd know it was the last thing you – "

"What?" So maybe it wasn't just sentiment that made Ste want to hear _I love you too_: maybe he felt it too, the need to do right by each other in case each parting was their last. Maybe everyone felt it when they loved someone this much.

"Cos if you died in the night," Ste repeated, "I'd know it was the last thing you said to me, wouldn't I."

"Why is it me that's dying in the night?"

"Cos you're older."

"Oh, cheers for that. That's a lovely thought to go to bed with, Steven. Jesus."

"I'm not saying you're gonna die in the night, am I. I'm just saying, like, if one of us was gonna die in the night, it'd be you."

"Steven!"

Ste laughed, but he'd spooked himself, and he said to Brendan, "Stop talking about it, then," and he stroked the arm that was wrapped around him, and it felt real and reassuring and permanent.

"You started it." Brendan tightened his hold. "I ain't going anywhere, alright?"

"Alright."

They were quiet again, their breathing the only sound in the room.

"I do, by the way," Brendan said after a minute. "What you asked me. I do miss you dropping by when I'm at work."

"Pestering you, you mean?"

"Yeah. I can't quit the job though, Steven, it's gonna see me through till my parole's up and we can get away."

"I don't want you to quit, do I, it's a good job."

"So I was thinking, how about we get a place in town? You know, give this flat up and get somewhere of our own, closer to the club?"

"What, like buy a place, instead of renting?"

"Then if we do the Dublin thing in a couple of years, we can sell it, or keep it for when we come back to see the kids. Just an idea, okay? We'll talk about it in the morning, though, I gotta get to sleep."

"So we could, like, decorate it how we want and that?"

"Yeah, however you want. Long as you don't pick no tacky wallpaper..."

"You saying I got bad taste? I chose you, didn't I?"

"Night, Steven."

"Night." Ste was silent for a few moments. "I'll be able to check up on you at work eyeing up them bloody footballers."

"I don't even see them, Steven. You know I don't."

"Good."

"Cos I love you, you idiot."

"Night, then, Brendan."

Brendan waited, and listened to Ste's breathing getting slower and deeper as he got closer to sleep.

"Steven? Are you not gonna – ?"

"Say it back?"

"Don't get smart with me, or I'll – "

"Shut up, Brendan. I love you too."


End file.
